Mr Beautiful
by CitizenKay
Summary: Sara's reaction to Lincoln's news that Michael might be alive and the home invasion.


**Mr. Beautiful**

"Mom? Can a _man_ be beautiful?"

"What, baby?"

"You said he was beautiful. My _real_ father. When I asked you what he was like, remember?"

They were driving home after visiting Jacob in the hospital, and Sara's mind was a million miles away. She needed to focus on the road, she realized with a start. And she had to answer his question.

"Yes…a man can be beautiful!" She visualized Michael, who could have indeed been described that way. "I meant that he was very handsome," she explained. "You've seen pictures of him." Pictures, she knew, that couldn't do him justice. Pictures that could never recapture his voice, or his touch…

"Yes." Mike sat very still next to her. "I wish I could have met him. Before he died." He sounded wistful.

"So do I. You would have liked him, Mike. He was…a beautiful man…in other ways too. He was very brave. He tried to do what was right, even when it was hard." After all these years, she still missed Michael so much it hurt. Emotions flooded through her. It wasn't just the home invasion that had rattled her. She was sure of that.

Lincoln had rattled her. His hope had unnerved her. It was painful to think about Michael, like ripping the bandage off a wound. But she owed it to their son to answer his questions about his father.

"He loved you, you know," she told him, tears springing to her eyes. "Even before you were born. He was so excited about you. He talked about you all the time."

"He did? What did he say about me?" Mike's eagerness shone on his face, making her heart break a little for him.

"Well…we talked about what we were going to call you. I wanted to name you Michael, after him." She thought back to their long-ago baby name discussions. "He liked that, as long as we didn't call you 'Junior.'" You _are_ junior of course, because your name is the same as his—Michael James Scofield- but he didn't want us to call you that." She didn't mention that they had also discussed girl's names.

"What else?" Mike asked, intensely curious.

"He talked about what you would look like, what things you might like to do, where you would go to school, what sports you would play. Things like that." She paused, remembering.

"You're like him in so many ways. He was really smart, like you are, and he was good at solving puzzles." Mike smiled, a faraway look in his eyes, imagining the father he'd never known.

"He was thrilled about us having you, and a little bit nervous too because he hadn't been around babies much. He wanted to read every baby book there was so he could be the best dad…" She had to stop then, afraid she'd burst into tears if she continued.

"What's the matter, Mom?"

"Nothing, baby." She slipped a hand into her pocket and grabbed a tissue to stop her tears. Fortunately, they were turning into their driveway.

Later, after giving him dinner and a bath, she double-checked the doors and windows and tucked Mike into her own bed. She wasn't going to let him out of her sight, not if he might be in danger.

When her head hit the pillow a few minutes later, she couldn't fall asleep. She had thought of Michael every single day, and she had automatically squelched those thoughts. Grief was a luxury she had never permitted herself. She knew that her avoidance was not healthy.

Now pictures of Michael rose up in her mind, and this time she didn't try to stop them.

She remembered the first time she had heard him referred to as 'beautiful.' It was back in Fox River. Michael had been incarcerated for maybe two weeks, and he was waiting in the hall for his insulin shot when Katie, her nurse, had handed her his chart. "Your one o'clock, Mr. Beautiful, is here," she'd teased. Sara had had to work hard to fight back a grin. She couldn't do a thing to stop herself from blushing though. She'd turned her head away to hide her embarrassment, knowing why this particular prisoner made her blush, telling herself to get a grip.

Michael Scofield had blue, blue eyes that saw right through her. He was charming, flirtatious, and clearly intelligent. If he was undressing her with those eyes, he was too much the gentleman to show it. And if she wanted him to…? She couldn't let herself go there.

He was like a ray of blinding sunlight…a breath of fresh air compared to the brutes she was accustomed to seeing in the infirmary. She had to keep reminding herself "He's an _inmate_ , Sara!" Despite her best intentions, she'd been drawn closer to him than she should have allowed herself to be.

The rest, of course, was history. She'd fallen hopelessly in love with him. She'd fought it for weeks, but she had never met any man who came close to him, not before. And not after.

When she'd known for certain she was pregnant with his baby, she had felt like she could fly. Nothing in her life had matched that joy, or that terror. And then of course, she had lost him…her beautiful Michael.

The way she had survived it was due entirely to the beautiful boy sleeping beside her, the child he had left her.

She sighed, and a tear rolled down her cheek. Lincoln's visit had opened the book that she had tried so hard to close for seven years: "Mr. Beautiful."

At last, she fell asleep and dreamed that she was walking on a beach in the fog. A man was walking ahead of her. She knew she ought to know him, but his name wouldn't come. He began walking away faster and faster, and then he was running, and suddenly she knew! It was Michael! She tried to run after him but her legs sank in quicksand. She tried to shout to him, "Wait!" but her voice stuck in her throat. He was vanishing in the fog when she jolted awake in a cold sweat.

Panicked, she got up and checked the doors again. The house was quiet. The sun was just rising.

She felt hollow, like the bottom had dropped out from under her and she was free-falling.

What was going to happen? What if Lincoln was right? What if it was true, that Michael was alive? How could it be, when he'd had terminal brain cancer? And if he _was_ alive, why had he left her, and why would he have abandoned the child they'd wanted so much?

And what if Lincoln was wrong? She couldn't wrap her mind around that loss again. Her life with Jacob would be… empty.

She only knew that she wanted Michael back now, so desperately that she could taste it.

Either way… _what was she going to do?_


End file.
